“You do a little.”

He blushes. “Yeah, the part of me that used to hide in my room with Eragon and Harry Potter. But they’re not real.”

“It is real.” I hesitate, wondering what Jake will think of Grey. “You’ll see. At midnight. You’ll see.”

“Even if this magical swordsman appears—”

“He’s not magical.”

“Fine.” Jake rolls his eyes. “Even if this completely mundane swordsman appears, I can’t just snap my fingers and leave home. It’s nuts, Harper. Do you understand what you’re asking me to do?”

“I understand that you’re not going to be safe,” I say. “You think Lawrence isn’t going to hold what you’ve done over your head to make you do more for him?”

He flinches but doesn’t say anything. We sit and watch the odd car roll down the road. Somewhere in the distance, a woman is shrieking at someone: a child or a boyfriend. No way to know.

Darkness eventually slips out of the sky to wrap us up. The store closes. I’m curled on the bench, leaning against Jake. So much about him is familiar. His scent. The pattern of his breathing.

“Harper.”

I jerk awake. The street is pitch-black and I’m freezing.

“It’s almost midnight,” says Jake. “Do you have to do something special?”

Adrenaline hits me harder than a shot of espresso.

It’s almost midnight.

Grey is coming. This is it. I’m saying goodbye to Jake … possibly forever.

My breathing is quick and rapid. I look at the darkened streets, at the narrow store doorway.

Jake must read my panic, because he says, “Harper. We can just go home. You don’t have to go anywhere.”

“What time is it?” I demand.

“It’s eleven fifty-nine.”

I swallow. Leave it to Grey to bring it right down to the minute.

I don’t know what to do. Jake takes my hand. “It’s okay,” he says. “Whatever you decide.”

I count to sixty.

Then I do it again, in case I did it too fast. And again.

Grey doesn’t appear.

A strangled sound comes out of my throat.

“It’s okay,” Jake says again.

I punch him in the shoulder. “It is not okay.”

Something happened.

Grey would show. I know he would.

“We need to wait,” I say to Jake. “Just—we need to wait.”

We wait all night.

Grey doesn’t show.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

MONSTER

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

HARPER

I had this moment in Emberfall, when I was in the stables behind the inn, when everything around me felt real, and my real life in Washington, DC, felt like a dream. A fantasy.

That’s happening again. In reverse.

Two days have passed since Grey was supposed to return. I’ve spent so much time in the doorway of the shop across the street that they’ve called the cops and accused me of loitering. I’ve walked the streets Grey and I walked to get home. I’ve waited in the alley where we first appeared.

I should be helping Jake figure out what to do with Mom’s body. I should be trying to find Dad. I should be going through Mom’s things or praying in church.

By Thursday night, Jake finally agrees to invite Noah over. We don’t have much food in the apartment, but we throw together macaroni and cheese and hot dogs, along with two cans of green beans from the cupboard.

If anything makes Emberfall feel like a fantasy my mind concocted, it’s this food.

I can see why Jake loves Noah. I knew it from the pictures I could see on Jake’s phone, but it’s entirely different to meet him in person. We’re playing cards, and his long, slender fingers flip them easily when he shuffles. His voice is deeper than Jake’s, and he has a quiet, gentle manner that’s soothing. He’s also casually familiar with my brother, little touches and moments of warmth that take me by surprise. It’s a nice counterbalance to the anxiety and sorrow that’s been seeping through the walls of our apartment.

Noah sits across from me, and I’m not sure how much Jake has told him about where I’ve been, but it becomes painfully clear when he says, “Harper. Jake says you had quite the adventure.”

“Yeah,” I say noncommittally. I don’t know if he’s patronizing me or what, but I know he doesn’t believe me. When Grey didn’t show, I’m pretty sure I kissed Jake’s belief goodbye, too. As I put together dinner, I heard Noah murmur things like coping mechanism and escapist fantasy and you don’t know what she’s been through.

Noah deals cards around the table. We’re playing crazy eights, but I wish I had a deck of Grey’s hand-painted cards so I could say, Look. I didn’t make it up. It was real.

“Jake mentioned you fashioned an alliance with a false country,” says Noah. “It’s creative, I must say.”

“It’s nuts.” Jake snorts. “Why would anyone believe that?”

I scowl and say nothing. Maybe it was a little nuts, but it was working.

“Maybe not,” says Noah. “If the president came on television and said we were involved in a war with a country you’d never heard of, you wouldn’t get on a plane to find out for yourself, would you?” Noah shrugs. “Why do you think conspiracy theorists gain any traction?”

Jake considers this, then glances at me. “He’s too smart for me.”

“Probably,” I agree.

He smiles and gives me a good-natured cuff on the shoulder. “Speaking of smarts, do you want to look at re-enrolling in school?” Jake says to me.

My hands hesitate on the cards. High school feels like a million miles away. Even when I was going, my mind was here, with Mom. With the mess Dad was making of our lives. I kept my head down and got my work done, but I doubt anyone was surprised when I disappeared. “It’s the first week of April. You think they’re just going to let me back in?”

“You need to graduate, Harper. We could find out what you need to do to take the GED. We can’t rely on your bag of gold forever—if we can even figure out a way to sell it without looking like we stole it.”

Like the food we’re eating, nothing drives home the permanence of this situation like Jake talking about the GED and me needing to get a job.

Welcome home. I’d be laughing if it weren’t all so pathetic. A week ago I was a princess trying to save a country. Now I’m wondering if the grocery store is hiring.

A heavy knock sounds at the door.

Jake is on his feet before the knocking is complete. A knife finds my hand.

“Whoa,” says Noah. He flattens his cards against the table.

“Shh,” Jake says fiercely. He makes a slashing motion against his throat.

Something shifts against the door again.

“Lawrence?” I whisper.

“I don’t know,” says Jake.

I tiptoe to the door and look through the peephole. All I see is dark clothing. Whoever stands outside is all but leaning against the doorjamb.

I tighten my grip on the knife and ease to the side so I’m not directly in front of the door. Jake is right at my back. Noah is sitting at the table, wide-eyed.

“Who’s there?” I demand loudly.

Something shifts against the door again. Then a male voice says, “My lady.”

My heart stops. I throw the lock.

The first thing I see is his face, drawn and pale and smudged with dirt—or worse.

Then I see all the blood: it’s everywhere, on his armor, on his empty sword scabbard, on his cloak.

“Grey,” I say. “Grey, are you—”

He starts to fall. He outweighs me by at least a hundred pounds, especially with the armor and weapons, but I drop the knife and step forward to catch him. Jake is suddenly beside me, lending his strength to the effort. Together, we ease Grey to the ground and get the door shut.

Blood oozes from everywhere. Under his armor, around his boots, through his sleeves. It’s already on the carpet. His uniform is torn in several places. One especially deep gash cuts across his arm. His eyes are closed and he lies in a heap, breathing shallowly.

“Grey.” I want to put my hand on his chest to shake him a little, but I don’t want to hurt him. “Grey, please.”

He doesn’t respond. A small sound escapes my throat.

Noah drops to a knee beside me. He picks up the knife, and when he speaks, his voice is all business. “His name is Grey?”

I nod, and he says, “Grey, can you hear me? I’m going to try to find out where all the blood is coming from.” Without waiting for a response—not that he gets one—Noah takes the knife and starts cutting through the leather buckles that hold Grey’s armor on. Claw marks have gouged lines in the leather. The straps are slick with blood, but the blade is sharp and slices right through. The uppermost strap is already broken.

Noah’s eyes flick up to Jake. “He’s in shock. Call nine-one-one.” Then he looks at me. “Get some towels.”

“No.” I swallow and look at Jake. “I mean—you can’t. You can’t call.” I have no idea what a hospital would do with Grey, but I can’t imagine they’d treat him and let him walk out the door. He has no identification. No insurance. There would be questions we can’t answer.